how do you create a fun and engaging boss that isnt just a >bullet

When it comes to a climax, a good final fight is 80% music

Bed of Chaos is a good example of a bad boss

>gimmick boss
>huge sweeping attacks that are hard to dodge
>several bottomless pits nearby into which said attacks can knock you into

EVERYBODY LOVES SOMEBODY SOMETIMES

>>376197149
This, honestly.

>>376197013
In my opinion, give it attacks that require both skill and quick thinking to dodge. Like make the player have to realize where to go to avoid them, but don't let them completely off the hook afterwards. Like flooding some platforms with lava, but shooting some avoidable danmaku at the height the player gets to as well.

This is just one part, but I figured I'd mention since in some games bosses just use moves that are avoidable in the same, albeit skillful way, and in others they use moves that are just trivial once you have the knowledge of how to get out of the way.

>>376197013
The only difference between a bullet sponge and an amazing fight is how good the boss's attacks are.

Boss quality is all about content ratio. If the boss takes a hundred hits, he better have a damn good arsenal. And if he has a wealth of cool moves, he better not fucking die in three hits like a chump

>>376197013
ROM THAT FUCKING CUNT SPIDER
I'm still mad

>>376197893
Don't say bad things about Rom like that. It's rude.

>>376197013
Azel from God Hand is an example of a good boss, but some of these apply to a lot of the other bosses and the basic enemies too:
>A.I. is more aggressive and quicker the higher the difficulty gets
>quicktime event (if ever) has to feel extremely involving
>cut scene mid-fight has to be short but sweet (Azel stops the fight at half health, shows a quick "enough of this silly game" and uses his trump card. He no longer makes a cutscene if he reuses that move unless you fucked up and have to do it over again)
Also >>376197149
Rival fights are basically guaranteed hype since they use what you use, but more proficiently in some ways (or they're you if you were any good at the game).

>>376197013
Just make something where I'm moving constantly dodging red circles

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>>376197013
Learn from the best.

>>376197982
The character action genre is the prime example of good bosses. Most of the good bosses in DMC3 (aside from the shitty ones like Blob and Hearts of course) are very varied: Vergil, Cerberus, Beowulf, etc.

Make the boss literally you.

>>376197013
You make an Action game and then you do this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_owQkiI-ihw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6aE8GGFJzsM

Random chosen clips, can't vouch for quality

Bad bosses are slow (either attacks themselves or too much cooldown in between them), they're static (follow the same premade pattern of attacks with no variation in either the attack order or positioning), they don't have enough attacks to justify their big health pool, they have a small amount of vulnerable states which leads to a lack of depth (glowing weak points suck because of this) and they ignore a lot of the game's normal mechanics in favour of forcing you into one single playstyle. The best boss fights avoid all those, they're fast, dynamic, have a wide variety of moves, lots of ways different ways to damage them without obvious weaknesses and don't just allow but encourage you to use all the same mechanics you've used the whole game.

>>376198225
RPGs are a pretty good example of bosses that are hard to be engaging, most of them are rather cheesy and resort to typical tactics or you have to just do one thing to win. I think the only engaging boss I ever fought was Demi-Fiend in Digital Devil Saga because it came down to counting turns, knowing who he was and how his music was playing during the whole fight. It was fun while it lasted even if it came down to some RNG bullshit praying instant death spells away.

>>376197013
>what makes a bad boss
One example is if the boss spams cheap moves with few to no openings, forcing you to constantly dodge until he decides to randomly use a move that you can punish.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MxhSTu3SFR0

>>376197013
TWOAH

>>376198692
That's shit and could have been easily fixed by shuffling the moves instead of completely randomizing them

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>>376197149
Pretty much.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGkCtW1VbsE

>>376197013
>Monster hunter

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>>376197149
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C1Ose7A8P94

>>376197013
Best bosses are the ones that don't require many hits, but are hard to hit. Like Dark Souls.

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>>376197149
Music, gameplay and emotional climax are all part of the experience imo

Easy. You give the boss mechanics that engage the player and requires him to adapt on the fly.

Take, for instance, the classic "crumbling platform" gimmick. The fight takes place on a weakened structure or something equally brittle, and the boss' pounding attacks destroy a part of the platform where ever they hit. This requires the player to be mindful of their positioning as they could face a much harder fight than it needs to be if they are not.

>>376198985
3rd fight track is legit anti hype trash

I've never played a game with a truly exceptional final boss. Most memorable one that sticks out in my mind is King K Rool in the first DKC, and that's not because the fight is particularly good it's just because of that beat drop.

>>376197013
A boss similar to the player who isn't giant, moves fast, and hits hard but doesn't take off huge swaths of your health bar.

also his health should be slightly higher than whatever the player's current health is, and his only real advantage should be his movement, so good AI.

>>376197827
That's a good analogy. Ornstein and smough don't feel like sponges but 1/2 the bosses in das3 do because they all have relatively the same number of moves

If your boss has a QTE in it, even if it's parody, it's a shit boss fight.

No exceptions whatsoever.

QTEs are fucking awful trash.

I was watching a stream I follow the other night and they were playing outlast 2 for the first time, I don't care about le spooky vidya gaems XD LE JUMPSCARE nonsense so I was about ready to leave, I stayed for the opening cutscene or whatever the fuck.

Helicopter crashes, and your character wakes up in a daze under some debris. Fair enough right?

There is a fucking QTE to make the character push the debris off.

There is zero need for that QTE to be there. The character would obviously push that off if able, without your consent.

The smallest little QTE shit like that is a redflag to a terrible game.

Super Mario world has bosses not pertaining to any of those

>>376199135
muh immersion and muh player agency, basically

Sometimes it feels better if you have a (small and forced) hand in making your character do cool things, like Asura's Wrath

>>376199135
>If your boss has a QTE in it, even if it's parody, it's a shit boss fight.
>No exceptions whatsoever.
>QTEs are fucking awful trash.

What an absolutely fucking retarded over simplified generalization

>I was watching a stream

And there it is

>>376199135
>If your boss has a QTE in it, even if it's parody, it's a shit boss fight.

I'm actually fine with a QTE to end the fight. Which means you utterly defeat him regularly and then do the finisher with a QTE to do something flashy. Not something like several QTE's midfight and a final one to strip the last 5-10%. Just one to really fuck his shit that looks better than any of your gameplay moves.

Every boss battle needs to get progressively harder. This can be from the environment changing or the boss trying different attacks. The only issue is tuning the battle so that each "phase" doesn't last too long and get boring.

>>376199217
>Asuras's Wrath
>Good example of QTE

Jesus christ. At least say Resident Evil 4 or something. Having the entire game based on QTE is movie-tier in AW.

>>376199132
It's not the amount of moves. O&S have only a few moves as well, it's the dynamic nature of a fight with more than one enemy that keeps the fight interesting. When you're fighting a single enemy in a Souls game, their positioning is completely irrelevant and their move choice only changes your roll timing, that's why a low number of attacks gets boring. In group fights the positioning of enemies matters a lot, and the different attacks can combine and overlap so you always have to pay attention. There's also the element of randomness so the fight will never play out in the same way.

>>376199282
>EVERY BOSS MUST BE THE SAME!!!!!!11

>>376199086
Because the spectacle climax is the Arkham fight

Vergil 2nd fight's track is pure hype since it's a duel. 3rd fight is him being desperate and cornered for the first time

>>376199329
>Resident Evil 4

Are you literally retarded? RE4 might just be one of the most egregious examples of shitting the bed with QTEs

>>376199282
I think more games should steal from Shadow of Mordor and make bosses become more difficult each time you lose against them.

>>376199394
>I died during a cutscene wah

>>376197013
attack patterns

The boss is aggressive and smart. Shit players will get trounced and die immediately, ok players will have to use all their defenses and healing abilities to stay alive, good players will be able to flip the script and keep the boss on the defensive.

>>376199460
What did the qtes add to the game besides a minor annoyance on your first playthrough?

And flung him into the future where my portal is evil

>>376199514
Melee opportunities depending on how you stunned them.

>>376199515
Now the fool seeks to return to the future and flung him in my ass.

>>376199515
>his portal isn't extra thicc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=arFEKKb8FAk

>>376199346
>Because the spectacle climax is the Arkham fight

Now I've fucking heard everything.

>>376199329
Resident Evil 4 had a lot of bullshit QTEs. It made some cutscenes unskippable, and I can't name a worse one than when Leon met Krauser. Combat-wise the QTEs were not that terrible as they were basically a dodge button combination but everything else was stupid and even dumber than the Outlast 2 example listed earlier because Leon could have dodged any of the abrupt in-cutscene bullshit without any player input if we're going by that over-generalized excuse used earlier.

>>376199460
It was a rhetorical question but thanks for answering

>>376199585
That's not a qte, that's just a context sensitive action mid gameplay a button prompt. It would work just as well without the button prompt if it was introduced to the player, same with dodges. Qte generally refers to the garbage shit during cutscenes

Memes aside, I love the Micolash boss fight, partially because it bucks what you would expect from a good boss in the game. Instead of dodgerolling around some monstrous nightmare beast you're chasing around some gibbering madman who isn't even particularly difficult.

So, is this a jack thread or actualy vidya?

Im rolling with any, realy. Jashi is a cute severely autistic couple.

>>376197013
Furi

I missed jack, anyone have the mega?

>>376199702
>>376199643
I feel The Force Unleashed had decent boss QTE's if you could fail them.

>old iron king
yo lemme just slam my fist here and leave it for 20 seconds for you to hit it before i react

>>376199772
A good description of 90% of western action game bosses

>>376199607
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=31-YOZ_dY0g

I think Vergil (DMC3) is a good fight in all 3 iterations.

Here are some are some points:

>he's cool (a lot of bosses people consider bad in games are not cool i.e. they look stupid or unappealing)
>he's the size of the player
>he's aggressive
>he doesn't have specific vulnerability windows that are timed, you have to stagger him to get extend vulnerability (and to stagger him, you have to out maneuver him)
>he has ways of avoiding damage if you just spam, and he has recover moves (bad bosses don't)
>he's aggressive so you can't just fall asleep if you're not attacking
>he hits hard but no instakill or guaranteed death

>>376199772
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cAdVpJC4n3I

>>376198813
>I love being the boss. When I don't like someone I get to do THIS!

>>376197013
Outside game mechanics, one trait to include is build up. It does not have to be the most fantastic thing, but leave any indication that the boss has been where you are standing now or that you are approaching a current boss. Anything from the environment some time early on matching the traits of the boss (Mega Man games) or the boss "following" you across the stage in different ways (in Freedom Planet during Final Dreadnought, the soon-to-be final boss reacts to your presence during the first part, messes with you during the next part, then threatens you in person at the third part even before you fight him which makes for a satisfying confrontation).

The next part is to make sure whatever tools the game gives you can be used against bosses. The tools the game gives you should not be useless against a boss, forcing you to only rely on the basic moves and tools. If a game gives you tools, it should allow the player to create their own playstyle and use it against everything as they see fit, even if it is not the most optimal way to handle it. There are exceptions to the rule that work like using one tool to make room for another tool, but it should not be completely meaningless to bosses.

This point is a little broad, but if a game introduces a large boss, it should not be designed so that the player can only attack the feet to make them fall down. The Souls game have examples of that. Understanding the problem, the player should be given some kind of mobility tool that lets them engage with the boss. The mobility given should function for all parts of the game and not used for only the giant boss fight.

One of the biggest points for me are boss reactions. Responses from getting cocky from hitting the player to getting annoyed from how much they've been hit and anything in between. It doesn't require dialogue either. Anything that shows the boss isn't an emotionless husk during the fight is good. Progressive changes help.

There's a lot to cover.

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>>376199845
>he hits hard but no instakill or guaranteed death

He can be absolutely brutal. I like that you can use a lot of setups against him which is part of the game's advanced mechanics. Even Nevan is useful to break his Spiral Sword

>>376197149
STANDING HERE

Before the final bloooow was struck, I toooore my ass open and flung him into the future

>>376199995
was this recorded with a garage door remote?

>>376199995
Keep in mind the player wasn't at full HP in this. But yeah phase 3 can be brutal, as the boss should be.

>>376197013
FPS games have a hard time with bosses, because it's usually either "bullet sponge" or "attack weak spot"

>>376199845
Is there a way to break out of his combo if he manages to hit you? Always hated that about the fight, I'd rather take the same amount of damage but only get hit once instead of getting combod. No worse feeling.

>>376200205
Serious Sam The First Encounter had the worst final boss to me. It was a puzzle boss. Thankfully The Second Encounter was much better. I'll take dodging bullshit bullet sponges over puzzle bosses.

>>376200257
Activate your own DT to reduce the damage

Managing your DT with taunts is a huge part of that fight

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>Boss is a floating head with hands

>>376200342
>head with hands ends up being one of the boss fights ever made
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7oqK3DXSnSQ

I liked Aesir in Bayonetta 2, good culmination of every humanoid boss fight in the series

>>376200284
Most of Serious Sam's bosses are kinda shit, if we're being honest.

In TFE you have a super jacked up version of a regular enemy, a room with tons of enemies, and the final boss is like you said, just a puzzle (a bad one at that).

In TSE Kukulkan looks cool but he doesn't really do much to damage you. Exotech Larva is probably the best boss of the bunch because he can actually kill you and his form changes depending on damage taken (although he has a little too much health for my liking). Mordekai ... he's really lame. Not as annoying as Ugh-Zan but really disappointing.

SS2 had some weird ones but I don't remember any boss being particularly bad or annoying. Mental Institution is pretty boring, but at least it's a straightforward fight.

In SS3 we're back to "jacked up regular enemies" which is particularly fucking horrible with the Arachnoid, Technopolip and Witch Bride. Ugh-Zan IV was fun because of the jetpack, but I still would have liked a one on one.

>>376200436
Bayo's dad (hooded/no wings mode) is the best boss though